While You Wait For Borderlands 3, Here's Borderlands 2 In VR

Borderlands 2 is getting a virtual reality version. 2K and Gearbox has announced that a new version of the 2012 game, Borderlands 2 VR, will arrive for PlayStation VR on December 14.

The VR edition was developed in-house at Gearbox Software. It’s the same Borderlands 2 experience you remember, but in VR and with a few twists. The VR edition includes a feature that lets you slow down time–and it’s called Bad Ass Mega Fun Time, or BAMF Time.

“Activating BAMF Time will give you the speed and reflexes of a rabid skag, allowing you to dodge bullets, pull off 360 no-scope headshots, and even use your Action Skill to fight off hordes of bandits, bullymongs, and whatever else Pandora might throw at you,” Gearbox producer Brian Burleson said in a blog post.

Unlike the traditional Borderlands 2 game, the VR edition is exclusively single-player. That meant Gearbox had to adjust character skills that required a co-op partner, including Maya’s “Res” ability. In the VR edition, it’s called “Empathy,” and it has a big change.

It causes “Phaselock to deplete half your current health, damaging enemies based on how much health you lost, and doubling healing during BAMF Time,” Gearbox explained.

Gearbox also updated the skills off the game’s four classes–Siren, Commando, Gunzerker, and Assassin–with “unique combat styles” that make use of virtual reality in some capacity. And when driving vehicles, you control the steering wheel with motion controllers and the headset. Additionally, you can move around the world with either the traditional joystick approach or through a “pointed-teleporation” mode.

Everyone who pre-orders gets a dynamic PS4 theme featuring the four main characters: Salvador, Maya, Axton and Zer0. In the US, Borderlands 2 costs $50, but international pricing was not announced.

“To now bring that spicy special sauce up close and personal in a VR world, it’s beyond what we could have ever hoped for all those years ago,” Burleson said. “We’re excited to go back home to Pandora for the holidays, and we hope you are too. All aboard the poop train!”

Launched in October 2016, PlayStation VR has sold more than 3 million units since then. According to Sony, Skyrim VR has been the most-played PlayStation VR game so far, with PlayStation VR Worlds, Rec Room, Resident Evil 7, and The Playroom VR rounding out the top five.

In May this year, Sony acknowledged that the growth in the worldwide market for virtual reality games has been below what the company expected. NPD Group video game analyst Matt Piscatella believes VR on consoles will stay a “niche” market.

Borderlands 2 shipped more than 18 million units, so it stands to become one of the biggest games, behind Skyrim, to launch a VR version for PlayStation VR. While Borderlands 2 VR is an exciting announcement in the Borderlands universe, fans are likely more eager to finally see the long-awaited Borderlands 3. In 2017, Gearbox studio head Randy Pitchford obliquely hinted at Borderlands 3, saying that 90% of the studio was “working on the thing I think most of you guys want us to be working on.” The game has not been formally announced, however.

Take-Two, the parent company of Borderlands publisher 2K, recently announced that one of 2K’s next big games–likely Borderlands 3 or the next BioShock–has been delayed to 2019 or 2020.